In this biennium I completed the next large segment of the
Études d'exécution imminent, being the three parts collected as
"Illustrations": Ghosting Doubles, Chorales, and
Frankie and Johnnie. Though quite varied in texture and surface
rhetoric, they have in common the notion, introduced in the
Corollaries, of treating the generating row forms as a row of interval
types, and of introducing, in each case, an extra-systematic element, from
which the systematically derived intervals hang, or are stacked, as the case
may be.
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Karen at the Oregon Trail Museum,
Baker City, Oregon
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In the case of
Ghosting Doubles that extra-systematic element is a melody
by my local colleague Amy Denio, originally for accordion, called
Ghosting. I composed three versions, or "sightings" on Amy's melody; one
for each transposition of the row form. Each such sighting consists of two
polyphonically presented lines, one above Amy's tune and one below. One
performance possibility I am particularly fond of is to begin with just the
melody, then play the melody with just one of the derived lines, then with the
other, then
just the derived lines (the original melody "ghosting" them, as it
were), and then with all three together.
For the 12 Chorales I used various schemes of cycling through portions
of the row forms in groups of three intervals, using those intervals to
generate the pitches harmonizing each note in a chorale tune, which tunes were
chosen from the justly famous Bach-Riemenschneider collection of Bach
chorales. I chose the particular chorale tunes non-systematically, but
basically I was looking for a variety of keys and, especially, a variety of
phrase lengths. In all but one or two cases I kept the chorale tune in its
original key, only transposing it if my generated harmonizations extended off
the bottom of the keyboard.
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your blogger at Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming
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Frankie and Johnnie is, of course, based on the titular traditional
American blues ballad. I used the collection of verses found in a "Songs of the
1890s" songbook, but notated the melody, and its rhythm, without specific
pitches or duration values. The accompaniment is based on a scheme of cycling
through the instant row form, depending the intervals from the integers of that
row form treated as pitch-classes. At least that's what I think I was doing. In
my conception of how it might be performed it is a bit like my folk-song opera
Old Bangum (2007), that is, an opera in which the person of the character
is played by the song, with music providing commentary, scenery, and support as
that persona-song enacts its tale of woe.
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Karen at The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone,
Yellowstone National
Park, Wyoming
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And we continued Banned Rehearsal and Gradus. Banned Rehearsal recorded sessions
926-948 in 2017, incorporating Telepaths 53-58 to pull Aaron in from Alaska, and
949-972 in 2018, with Telepaths 59-61. Neal recorded Gradus sessions 305-324 in
2017 and 325-342 in 2018. In addition I continued occasionally improvising solo
sessions and making field recordings. I gave two recitals in early 2018. The
first, in February, was the fifth entry in my cycle of "Preludes in Seattle",
performing Kam Morrills
Puppet Pieces, Benjamin Boretz's
Partita,
My
Two Pomes Play and
17 Prepuntal Contraludes, numbers 17-20 of
Ken Benshoof's
Patti's Parlour Pieces, and the respective
Preludes
17-20 of Lockrem Johnson, Ken Benshoof, Greg Short, and me. In March I presented
the
Études d'execution imminent up to where I had completed them, being
the first 8 ("Preface"),
Second Thoughts and
Corollaries ("Commentary"), and the three sightings of
Ghosting Doubles.
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your blogger at Isa Lake, at the
Continental Divide, Yellowstone
National
Park, Wyoming
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2018 also marked the passing of my father, Carl Richard (Dick) Eisenbrey, March
1, 1926 - July 8, 2018, from congestive heart failure, after having surviving
several heart attacks in the months preceding. My brothers and I spent quite a
bit of time with him and mom in the last few months, and found ourselves trying
to quickly find a safe haven for mom, who was suffering from Alzheimers.
Fortunately we were able to find a wonderful facility in Oak Harbor, some miles
north of Freeland, where they had been living for the last few years.
Early that June Karen and I did break away from the stress of that time for a
week to travel once again (and probably for the last time) to Yellowstone
National Park. We had a good time, stopping on the way in at Baker City to
visit the Oregon Trail Museum, and spending a day in Philipsburg, Montana on
the way home. We had passed by this picturesque little town the last time we
were there, in 2008, and I was glad we took the time to stop for a while. We
stayed in Jackson, and took in our usual favorite sites, including Old
Faithful on a particularly blustery day (hang on to your britches dear!) that
had the geyser blowing sideways. We timed our trip so that we could pick up
our son John from college at Eastern Washington University, in Cheney, on the
last leg home.
Banned Playout:
2017:
Numbered 926-948 12:00:38
Telepaths 53-58 4:00:50
Total 2017: 16:01:28
2018:
Numbered 949-972 12:29:46
Telepaths 59-61 2:00:06
Total 2018: 14:29:52
Grand Total: 909:25:54
Scores:
Êtudes d'exécution imminent
Recordings:
Ghosting Doubles
Chorales
Frankie and Johnnie
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